COLONIAL AMERICA —THE SEEDBED FOR RELIGIOUS DIVERSITY AND FREEDOM OF RELIGION

Ronald R. Zollinger

The early immigrants to America had many motives. The question of religion was one in which the early colonists took immediate and strong positions, and their legislation seldom reflected the attitudes of religious liberty and the ideal of separation of church and state that were later to become a hallmark of the American way of life. Most groups coming to America came in pursuit of freedom for themselves but not of religious liberty as a general principle. Many possessed the personal conviction that they were in possession of the true Christian faith, and they saw no reason to tolerate inferior forms of religion.

Virginia In 1584 Sir Walter Raleigh, Queen Elizabeth’s favorite, was granted a royal charter for a colony he named “Virginia” in honor of Elizabeth, the “virgin queen.” Raleigh’s third attempt to land a colony led to the establishment of Jamestown, named after King James I. Jamestown was Anglican but governed early on by Puritan principles that required strict observance of the Lord’s day, attendance at Sunday worship twice each Sabbath day, and stern punishment for profanity and immodest dress.

Initially, Virginians were intolerant of other religious persuasions, including Puritans from Scotland having Presbyterian views; many were forced to seek colonial life elsewhere. Quakers and Methodists established a minor presence.

Maryland King James detested Puritanism. In 1622, when a war broke out with the Indians, he placed Virginia under his direct rule. Later his son, Charles I, in order to seek Catholic support, granted to Sir George Calvert (a Catholic proprietor) a tract of land from Virginia that included the present Maryland and parts of Pennsylvania, West Virginia, and Delaware.

Many Catholics in England wished to have a colony where they could live without the restrictions and difficulties they constantly faced in England. Feeling that it was politically unwise to establish a purely Catholic colony, in 1649 the Calverts passed an Act of Toleration that established a place of religious tolerance in Maryland. Hundreds of dissident groups fled to Catholic Maryland to express their religious differences.

The first English Catholics arrived in 1634. Approximately one-tenth of the settlers were Catholic aristocrats, and the rest were mostly their Protestant servants. Eventually other Protestant (Anglican) immigrants settled and this Protestant majority succeeded in taking power from the landed Catholic aristocracy. Anglicanism then became the official religion of the colony, while the rights of Catholics were restricted. Throughout the colonial period, Catholics remained a minority in each of the thirteen colonies.

The Carolinas North and South Carolina were established in 1663 as a grant by the English crown to a group of aristocrats and stockholders. Although Anglicanism was established by law, immigration was fostered by extending religious freedom, thus attracting many dissidents from Virginia. The higher classes belonged to the Church of England, while many in the lower classes became either Quaker (Friends) or Baptists. Many were not affiliated with any denomination.

Georgia Georgia was founded with two basic purposes: to halt Spanish movement and to serve as an alternative for debtor’s prisons. The first convicts arrived in 1733, a year after the royal approval was granted. Religious refugees from outside England also found their way to Georgia. Although Anglicanism was the official religion, it made little impact upon the colony. The Wesleyans (Methodists) and the Moravians (from Germany) had a measure of success, but their numbers were never great. Through the efforts of George Whitefield, an associate of John Wesley and the Great Awakening evangelists who toured America in 1738–39, Methodists, Baptists, and others harvested converts to their religious orientation.

Massachusetts and Connecticut Massachusetts and Connecticut were both Puritan colonies.

Plymouth The Virginia company was in urgent need of settlers. In response, a group of English Puritans (Congregational Separatists) who had left England for the Netherlands looked to the New World as a place of refuge to establish a community based on their religious principles.

The Mayflower with 101 of these settlers and because of stormy weather missed Virginia and landed at Cape Cod. Later they moved their landing to a permanent colony known as the Plymouth Plantation, named after their port of departure at Plymouth, England. Before landing, they organized themselves into a political body—under the king of England but with the power to govern themselves. In their Mayflower Compact, they committed themselves to obey the laws passed by their own government.

Massachusetts Bay and Connecticut Unlike the Separatist Pilgrims at Plymouth, the English Puritans still belonged to the Church of England but wished for it to follow more closely the practices of the New Testament. They saw little hope for this in England and migrated to America, where they expected to bring their ideals to fruition. Because of the persecution experienced in England, some ten thousand Puritans fled to America, thus strengthening the colony of Massachusetts Bay and giving birth to the new colony of Connecticut and the colony of New Haven, located today in Southern Connecticut off the Long Island Sound.

The goal of a Christian commonwealth could only be achieved if the civil and religious communities were coextensive. Bitter debate over church procedures and practices, however, initiated what amounted to congregational rule based upon a Confession of Faith that was a revision of the Westminster Confession. In 1692, on the basis of idle accusations, rumors began circulating that witchcraft was widely practiced in Salem. The rumors eventually led to hysteria. In total, twenty people— fourteen women and six men—were hanged, and several others died in prison. After twenty years civil authorities ended the investigations; the courts of Massachusetts decided that the entire episode had been a gross injustice and ordered indemnifications to be paid to families of the victims.

Rhode Island and the Baptists The intolerance that reigned in the Puritan colonies forced some people to abandon them. Most famous among these was Roger Williams, who had arrived in Massachusetts in 1631. Williams was a strong advocate for a separation of church and state. He also felt that the colonies occupied land that belonged to the Indians, and that the entire colonial enterprise was unjust and illegal. Driven from Massachusetts, he settle in Narragansett on lands that he bought from the Indians. There he helped found the Baptist colony of Providence based upon the principle of religious freedom.

In 1637 the prophetess Anne Hutchinson, also driven from Massachusetts, cofounded Portsmouth on an island near Providence. On the other end of the island a group from Portsmouth founded the community of Newport. All of these communities grew rapidly with the influx of Baptists, Quakers, and others from the Puritan colonies. The existing Puritan colonists resented the growth of these communities from the “sewers of New England.” Eventually Roger Williams received legal recognition of the colony of Rhode Island and Providence Plantations from the short-lived Long Parliament. They were to be governed as a democracy with provisions allowing for religious freedom.

New Hampshire During the 1620–30s New Hampshire was settled by colonists who could not accept the religious intolerance of Massachusetts.

Delaware and Pennsylvania In 1638 a large group of Swedish Lutherans purchased land from the Indians to begin a settlement near Wilmington, Delaware. This colony issued the first edict against slavery and the first edict of religious toleration. Later this colony fell into the hands of the Dutch and was then ceded to England.

Although the basic inspiration for founding Pennsylvania was Quaker, from the very beginning its population was comprised of people of varied confessions. The same was true of Delaware, which William Penn bought from the Duke of York and which was part of Pennsylvania until 1701. In 1681 King Charles granted land in America to Penn in consideration of a debt the king owed to his deceased father. These lands formed the area of Pennsylvania and parts of Delaware and became the basis of a “holy experiment” of Penn; they eventually became a place of refuge for the Quakers.

These colonies had extensive powers of self-government, an abundance of cheap or free land for the industrious poor, and total freedom of religion. They became the first major example of the religiously pluralistic society that would eventually become the norm for the American way of life.

New Jersey East New Jersey followed the pattern of the strict New England Puritans, while in the west it was the Quakers who set the tone for the emerging society offering religious tolerance. Eventually, however, many of the Quakers of New Jersey became a slaveholding aristocracy whose relations with other Quakers were increasingly strained.

New York What later became New York was colonized by the Dutch, whose East India company established its local headquarters in Manhattan. Their Reformed Church (Presbyterian in polity) came with them. This settlement developed a cosmopolitan character attracting Huguenots, Lutherans, English Puritans, Mennonites, Quakers, and others. In 1664 this area came under the control of England. With the increase of British (Church of England) immigration, the Anglican composition of the colony approached that of Great Britain.

Factors Contributing to a Religiously Diverse Climate in Early Colonial America

• First Amendment Protection--Religious freedom--Separation of church and state (disestablishment)

• Immigration--Ethnic and religious eclecticism from European stock

• Revivalism and proselytization--Increased religiosity through the Great Awakenings

• Denominationalism--Freedom of religious interpretation leading to denominational institutionalism and form-fitted theology

• Volunteerism--Social consciousness leading to personal participation